What the CBZ Means When it Refers to “Lineal Championships”

By Mike
DeLisa

For the past
decade, the Cyber Boxing Zone has listed what have come to be referred to as
“Lineal World Champions” in each weight division. Frequently, we get e-mails or
other inquiries as to how we derived such lists.

First, and
most importantly, we emphasize the difference in meaning between the words
linear and lineal. Linear, of course, means a straight
line. Obviously, champions in just about every weight division have relinquished
their crowns by retiring, moving up in weight, or dying, so that concept is
irrelevant.

We use the
concept lineal, which means “descended from.” Every title that we list
“descends” from some champion or from a specific group of men who fought each
other to establish a champion.

Lineal
does not mean “unification” of the WBA, WBC, and IBF titles. Indeed, we give
only slight weight to the alphabet crowns. For example, on our heavyweight page,
we state: “As always, ludicrous decisions of ‘sanctioning bodies’ are ignored.”
On our middleweight page, we state it slightly differently: “This list gives
credit to The Man Who Beat The Man. Ludicrous decisions of sanctioning bodies
are ignored.”

“The
following list gives credit to The Man Who Beat The Man. As you will note, the
division had two reputable claimants who essentially created the division in
1962. Moyer’s lineage has been followed as Griffith abandoned the ‘title.’”

On the
junior-bantamweight page, I give a little more detail as to our reasoning:

“The
115-pound division was included as part of NY’s Walker Law of 1920, but our
research does not reveal any claimants to that title. The WBC resurrected the
115-poud class in 1980, with Venezuelan Rafael “Patono” Orono winning the title.
Orono lost to Chul-Ho Kim and then regained it from Kim in 1982, and then he
lost to Payao Poontarat. The WBA’s title started in 1981 with Gustavo Ballas,
who lost to Rafael Pedroza, who lost to Jiro Watanabe in 1982. Poontarat fought
Watanabe in July 1984 for the lineal title.”

As far as
the objection that this theory honors “bad decisions”—yup, we abide by the
decisions in the ring. Virtually every fight has at least some reporters
differing from the official judges, so we go with the official decision.

Perhaps the
most frequently cited objection deals with Roy Jones Jr., who was never lineal
light-heavyweight champion. At the time Tiger Michalczewski beat Virgil Hill,
they were the two best in the division, and thus established the man to beat.
Jones never fought the German, so even though he was clearly the best fighter in
the division for some period of time, he was not the lineal champ.

I would like
to point out that for at least the past 80 years, fractured titles have been a
way of life. The NBA, NYSAC, and IBU organizations frequently named their own
champions. At that time, however, The Ring magazine effectively listed
the lineal champions. Today, The Ring has forfeited its credibility by
pulling names out of its ass to name fighters as champions.

For more
info on lineal champions as we designate them, go to our Past Champions section
and click around. Feel free to post any questions on the CBZ message board.